Carl at a Railroad Crossing 2
by TimmyTurnerFan
Summary: The Sequel to the story Carl at a Railroad Crossing. Carl gets a big surprise in this story. See how he reacts to it. One Shot.


**Notice: **I do not own Arthur or the associated characters, they belong to Marc Brown.

**The Story**

One morning, Carl is sitting at the table waiting for his mother to finish cooking pancakes. As he is waiting, he is drawing a picture of a train like he does a lot, after all they are one of his big interests.

Carl's mother then gets down a couple glass plates from one of her upper cabinets. Then she places two pancakes each on both plates and brings them to the table, putting one plate near Carl and next to his picture he's working on, and then Carl puts his drawing aside and pulls his plate right in front of him.

"Thanks, Mom," says Carl.

"You're welcome, Sweetie," says Carl's mother.

Carl's mother then puts her plate where she's going to sit at the table.

"Want syrup on your pancakes, Carl?" she asks him.

"Yes, please," says Carl.

"And what would you like to drink?" she asks.

"I will have apple juice," says Carl, "in a box, not a bottle."

"You got it," says Carl's mother.

She goes to the refrigerator and gets out the syrup and a box of apple juice. She then brings the apple juice to Carl.

"Want me to pour the syrup on your pancakes?" Carl's mother asks him.

"No thanks," says Carl, "I want to do it on my own."

"Okay," says Carl's mother handing him the syrup. "Be careful, don't spill."

"I won't," Carl says.

And he pours the syrup on his pancakes and then gives the syrup back to his mother, who puts some of it on her pancakes. She also goes and gets herself a drink.

While Carl and his mother are enjoying their breakfast, Carl's mother has something to say to Carl.

"I have a surprise for you, Carl," she says.

"You do?" Carl asks.

"I sure do," she says, "and I think you're going to like it."

"Oh," says Carl, "what is it?"

"If I tell you," Carl's mother says, "it won't be a surprise. Now eat up."

"Okay, Mom," says Carl.

And he does.

Later Carl and his mother get in their car and go for a drive, but not to just anywhere. Carl's mother pulls up to a railroad crossing somewhere in Elwood City. This railroad crossing just has flashing lights and bells, no gates. The signals aren't flashing or sounding at the moment. Carl's mother pulls to the side of the road near the crossing.

"Okay Carl," says his mother, "let's step out of the car."

"Okay, Mom," says Carl.

Then she asks him, "Or do you just want to stay in?"

"No," says Carl, "let's get out."

"Okay," says his mother.

Carl and his mother open the doors to the car and step outside. Carl's mother then comes around to the other side to Carl.

"Now Carl," she says, "I want you to stay near the car and stay near me and stay where I can see you. And don't get too close to the railroad tracks."

"Okay, Mom," says Carl.

Carl listens to his mother and does not go to the train tracks or anywhere too far from the car.

Meanwhile several cars are passing by and crossing the tracks. This track is the main line going through Elwood City and supports freight and passenger trains.

Carl, thinking he knows why he's at the railroad crossing, wonders what the surprise could be. He is thinking that his mother brought him to see trains. He's kind of right, only he's going to see one train. Carl, however, does not know that he's not going to see just any train, he has no idea what's heading his way!

Soon, horns start to blare but they are faint at first.

"I hear a train coming Mom," says Carl.

"I hear it too," she replies.

"Can we see it?" asks Carl.

"Okay," she says, "but hold my hand please."

"Okay," Carl says.

Carl lets his mother take his hand as they continue hearing the train's horn and they walk toward the tracks and when they look to their left, they see bright white headlights in the distance approaching their direction.

"It's the train!" Carl says excitedly.

"It sure is," says his mother.

Carl knows it's a train but does not know what train is coming his way yet. Not whether it's a freight train or a passenger train but Carl thinks it's a freight train.

"Come on, Carl," says his mother to him, "let's get away from the tracks."

Carl and his mother walk back toward the car and Carl's mother allows him to sit on the hood of the car.

The train's whistle gets louder and louder as it gets closer. Then finally a little more than a minute later the crossing signal lights start to flash and the bells begin to sound. A few cars are still driving across the tracks despite the flashing lights. Carl doesn't know or understand why they're doing that but doesn't say anything about it. The rest of the cars that follow do obey the flashing lights and stop.

Finally the horn gets much louder and the train can be seen and smoke is being puffed out of the lead locomotive. The noise does cause Carl to get a little uneasy so he pulls his ears down and holds on to them tightly. Even though he does like the train's horns, he doesn't like that they're so loud and cannot handle it very well right now. His mother does turn and look at him and does pat his back a little.

As the train makes its last and loudest blare that can be heard by everyone at the crossing Carl and his mother are at, the train runs by. Carl's mother waves to the train locomotive and when Carl sees what his mother is doing, he tilts his head to the side a little and raises his shoulder to one of his ears and frees his hand to wave at the train. And as the train runs through the crossing, the men in the locomotive cab see them and wave back to them. Three blue locomotives pass through the crossing pulling a long string of freight cars. Carl finally uncovers his ears even though the train does continue blowing at other crossings it approaches.

Carl cannot believe his eyes!

"Look Mom!" he exclaims. "The cars are blue!"

"Yes they are!" shouts Carl's mother having to raise her voice over the noisy clickety-clack of the passing train, which is moving at 50 miles per hour.

Yes, all the freight cars passing by are blue, only Carl isn't fully aware of that yet. There are blue box cars, blue open hopper cars, and blue gondola cars. Also included are some blue live-stock cars. There are no tankers or covered hopper cars on this train.

As this train is passing by, Carl cannot believe that absolutely every freight car going by is blue and so far none of them are brown, at least he's not aware of that yet but he's starting to believe that every car he sees is going to be blue and hopes that that's what he is going to see.

Finally something dawns on Carl.

"Is this the surprise Mom?" he asks her.

"What's that, Honey?" she asks.

Carl asks the question again louder.

"Yes, Sweetie," she says to him, "this was the surprise!"

"Wow!" says an even more excited Carl.

Carl gets yet another surprise. Two of the box cars say something in an even lighter shade of blue. One car says CARL and the one after it says FOR, meaning "FOR CARL." Carl notices it.

"Hey, that's my name," says Carl seeing the box car with his name on it. "And the other said 'for.'"

"That's right Carl," says his mother.

"Wait a minute," says Carl, "this train is for me?"

"It sure is, Carl," answers his mother."

"Wow!" he says, "I can't believe it! A train… for me!"

"That's right!" says Carl's mother.

After about five minutes, the last car of the train, which is blue of course, passes through the crossing. Two seconds after the last car clears the crossing, the lights stop flashing and the bells go silent and the waiting cars start crossing the tracks.

"Mom," says Carl, "can I see the train again."

What he means is, he wants to take one last look at the train.

"Okay," says his mother, "but hold my hand."

Carl takes his mother's hand and they walk to the tracks and watch as the train gets further and further away from them.

"Okay Carl," says his mother, "let's go back to the car."

"Okay, Mom," he replies.

They then get back into the car and Carl's mother restarts the car. They wait for all the cars to pass and then Carl's mother drives across the tracks and finds another way back across at another crossing.

"Mom?" says Carl.

"Yes, Carl," she answers.

"How did you know that train was going to be there?" he asks her.

"Well," she starts, "remember the time we were at that crossing a couple weeks ago and you said you hoped to see a blue train?"

"Yes," says Carl, "I do."

"Well, wrote a letter to the railroad and asked them if they could make an all blue train and they wrote me back saying yes they would and that they would do it today."

"Really?" asks Carl.

"Yep," she says, "I told them you wanted to see blue cars instead of brown cars. And they wrote back to me saying they'd get their blue cars together and even paint over some of the brown cars with blue and they said they'd do this for you."

"Wow," says Carl. "Thank you Mom."

"You're welcome, Carl," she says.

"Thank you for not only bringing me to see the train but also for writing to the railroad asking them to do this."

"You're quite welcome," Carl's mother says.

"Can you write them again and tell them I said 'thank you?'" asks Carl.

"Why don't you write it yourself," Carl's mother suggests, and tell them 'thank you' that way it comes from you."

"That's a better idea," says Carl.

"And I'll mail it for you," she says.

"Thanks, Mom," says Carl. "That's exactly what I'm going to do when we get back home."

"Sounds like a good idea," says Carl's mother.

And away they go.

The End

**A/N** Carl had a really good idea in the prequel to this story about having an all blue train and that sounded like a good idea to me. I never thought of that until he said so in the last story. He likes blue instead of brown according to the episode "George and the Missing Puzzle Piece" also known as "When George Met Carl." It would be nice to see a train like that and Carl was very fortunate to get this. The idea sounded so good that I decided to do this for him.

I was going to write a story of Carl seeing an Amtrak train but I didn't have much of a story for it and didn't know what I wanted to say. It was originally going to be a Chapter 2, or Epilogue, then I was going to make it a Prologue, or Prelude to this story, but I didn't have many ideas and didn't know what all to say and I was afraid I wouldn't come up with enough words to put on this story and I was afraid you the readers would find it dull and boring and pointless and unentertaining, so I decided against the idea and just decided to make the story just as you read it.

The part that says "This track is the main line going through Elwood City and supports freight and passenger trains" came from Arthur2014's story about Arthur and the other characters at a railroad crossing.

**Cover Image:** Same Cover Image used in the prequel to this story.

**For railroad crossing fans and other interested readers:** This crossing, as you know, is gateless, but has two standard mast crossing signals with all 8" incandescent lights with 20" backgrounds, white crossbucks with RAILROAD CROSSING in black letters, and black 2 Tracks signs with White letters and numbers, indicating that there were two tracks at this crossing. One bell, the one closest to Carl and his mother, is an old Western Railroad Supply (W.R.R.S.) Co. mechanical bell and the other is a General Signals type 1 electronic bell. They were both going to be mechanical bells but I decided to do one type each.

This crossing probably should have had gates, being a 2 Track crossing, or this crossing probably should have been a 1-track crossing, but I decided to let this crossing be gateless. It's most likely going to be upgraded with gates on a later day.


End file.
